Literary Arts Magazine Spring 2010 | Page 55

Frederick Douglass, ca. 1879. Photograph by George K. Warren (d. 1884). National Archives: NARA hindrance and obstruction, he continued to learn by himself. As a slave, he didn‟t have an easy life. This master put him in different families as a worker. He worked hard and hard and he didn‟t have a time to learn. The day his master put him into Mr. Covey‟s house who was well known as a “negro-breaker,” his hope to be one day a free vanished. To break slaves, Mr. Covey used terrors by beating slaves every day until the blood flowed from their bodies. In addition, he gave them the hardest work they had to do quickly, not matter it was night or day. Mr. Douglass was nearly broken, but one day he decided to fight against Mr. Covey. He won the battle. Since that day, Mr. Covey didn‟t beat him. Then, Mr. Douglass rekindled his desire to be free man. Fortunately, after one year with Mr. Covey, his master put him again in the Auld‟s house, there where he had learned his first alphabetical letters. Although he suffered inhuman conditions, Mr. Douglas kept doing what he thought the most important, learning. When Mrs. Auld stopped teaching him on the orders of her husband, he imagined stratagems. One of them consisted of learning outside the home with the help of poor little white boys. To win their sympathy, when he met them, he brought bread. The boys appreciated that and they helped him in reading. Once he knew how to read, he began to read newspapers that he picked up in the street and even books. The first book he bought was “The Columbian Orator.” Another challenge was to write. It was not easy. The law, the people and even the Aulds were against him. Nobody had the courage to defy the law that prohibits the slaves teaching, so he opted to practice writing with his little white boys. As a poor slave, he couldn‟t afford to buy books and inks. So, he used different kinds of things; boarded fences, brick walls, pavements and lumps of chalk. Without anything, only his desire and determination, he succeeded in learning how to read and write. He became one of the most famous orators after he escaped from slavery. 54